War devastates the environment, the pollutants released during attacks cause serious harm to nature.

When armed conflict begins, the first thing we focus our attention on are the affected people, but even when the war stops, the problems caused by it do not go away. War destroys the environment. Artillery attacks, rockets and landmines release pollutants, which destroy forests and render agricultural land useless. One in six people in the world has been affected by conflict this year, including the civil war in Sudan, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the Israel-Hamas war.

In a way, the era of war has returned. The period of conflicts has been at its peak since World War II. Deaths are at a 28-year high. When assessing the loss of life and property caused by war, we should not ignore other losses caused by it, including damage to the environment. Armed conflict leaves a deep impact on the environment, resulting in adverse effects on our health and that of other living beings.

Pollution caused by chemical and other weapons remains in the environment as poison. Uranium pollutants released from explosives cause long-term health problems, while troop movements and damage to infrastructure worsen the situation. The damage caused by conflicts can last longer than you realize. The bloody Battle of Verdun during World War I in France polluted agricultural land once considered fertile. Today, more than a century after that war, no one can live in what is now called the Red Zone. As the Russia–Ukraine war progresses, severe air pollution, deforestation and soil erosion have increased.

Conflict causes loss of habitat and decline in biodiversity. Between 1946 and 2010, there was a significant decline in wildlife in African countries affected by armed conflict. The use of landmines during war is particularly dangerous because they remain in place until they are touched and explode. They may cause the death of people or animals, even long after the war has ended. Landmines have been discovered underground after flood waters passed in Libya, Ukraine, Lebanon and Bosnia-Herzegovina. There are many explosives which can tolerate intense heat for a short period of time. But when there is high temperature, they burst on their own.

This usually happens in West Asia, where temperatures remain very high. In Iraq, six ammunition depots exploded during the extreme summer heat between 2018 and 2019. A similar explosion at an ordnance depot is said to have occurred in Jordan in 2020 due to a horrific incident. At the end of a war, weapons are often thrown into the sea. From World War I to the 1970s, old munitions and chemical weapons were dumped into the sea in the United Kingdom. This may seem like a simple solution, but it does not eliminate the danger posed by it. More than one million tonnes of munitions are scattered on the bottom of a natural sea trench between Northern Ireland and Scotland. These sometimes explode underwater, while chemical weapons wash up on beaches.

Fierce fighting took place on the Solomon Islands during World War II. Even today, people die or get injured every year due to the explosion of bombs from that era. Fishermen have to be careful of underwater bombs. Overall we can no longer ignore the destructive relationship between war and environmental damage. Wars worsen our ability to deal with climate change, and environmental damage from conflict makes climate change worse.